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How to Make a Car Cake

The classic car is a wildly popular cake design for groom’s cakes, men’s birthday cakes, and father’s day cakes. This tutorial demonstrates how to make an easy 3D car cake with minimal carving. This particular groom’s cake was customized for a police officer and Mets/Giants fan but of course you can customize your car cake however you like.

1. Begin with the rectangular ¼ sheet cake. Carve the two narrow edges so that they are rounded.

2. Proceed in the same manner with the 6” x 6”, carving the edges off two mirroring sides until the top is arched. Carve the flat half-moon sides slightly so that they taper in towards the top.

3. Roughly crumb coat both cakes with vanilla buttercream and set them in the refrigerator to set. Once the crumb coat is firm, apply a second, thicker coat of buttercream. This second coat should be thick enough that the cake below does not show.

4. Trim and insert four ½ cm thick wooden dowels into the bottom tier within ¾” of the intended perimeter of the top tier (the top tier should sit towards the back of the bottom tier, not in the center). Follow this link to read my tutorial on how to use wood dowels in stacked cakes.

Roll out sheets to a thinness of 1/16”, allow to set, and trim into four pieces – two rectangular windshields and two half moon side windows. Be sure to cut the side windows so that the grain of the marble runs horizontally. This will lend the effect of reflections zooming by in the window, adding motion to the car. Trim the windows to fit ¼” from the edges of the cake so that enough white background remains to frame.

6. Using the clay extruder fitted with a 1/5 cm round die, create long strings of dark modeling chocolate. Allow them to set for 5-10 minutes or until they are easier to handle (do not leave them exposed to the air for too long or they will become brittle and break when bent). Starting at the bottom corner of each window, edge the seam with the chocolate string. The string should adhere with nothing more than a gentle press of the fingers as its being applied. When the ends meet, trim the excess with a craft utility knife.

7. Create the wheels by cutting two 2 ¼” circles and two 2 ½” circles out of a cake top, cake scrap, or extra slab of chocolate cake. Cut them so that they are angled in one direction. Truncate each one slightly so that when standing, they don’t roll. This way, they will be most stable when applied vertically to the sides of the cake.

8. Dip the tops of the wheels in chocolate glaze. Be careful not to touch the dipped surfaces with a fingertip or it will leave an impression in the chocolate. Set them in the refrigerator to harden for at least one hour.

Add the tires to the sides of the cakes. Pipe white chocolate trim to create a dripping effect here and there to remind people that it’s a cake. Pipe a buttercream frosting border around the edges of the wheels and around the base of the cake to seal seams. To learn how to form figurines out of modeling chocolate, check out this book.